zion's characters (RFA)

Her back is pressed against the cold wall. She doesn’t feel the cold though, not now, not ever, and her back slides down until she is curled into a ball. She hugs her knees close to her chest, her wide eyes staring on. She hears pacing coming from the other side of the house. Worried steps from left to right, and she follows the movement with equally anxious eyes. Her father turns and walks, turns and walks, occasionally glances out the frosted window, turns, walks, glances…

The wind blows, and in force. She winces, clamps her hands over her ears. The noise bothers her, threatens to whisk her away, it makes the hairs on the back of her neck rise and she exhales sharply. Please let it end, please—

“Kai, stay put,” her father’s firm voice breaks the monotony. She looks up at the man she has always admired, sees the tension in his wrinkled face, the quiver in his lips as he yanks the thick coat so hard that the hook it had been on falls limply to the floor.

Her eyes widen. “Dad, what are—”

“Stay put,” he repeats, the force behind his words silencing her. A lump forming in her throat, she nods. She watches Warner Peters open the door, watches the wind and snow force their way in, watches him disappear through it as the door slams shut. She is alone.

She knows why he did it of course. She knows that her father couldn’t bear the thought of her stepmother braving the blizzard alone in their broken-down car. Her father was always the caring man, the one who put himself before others. She could be like that too, she tells herself, if she wasn’t so fearful. She rests her head on her knees, her arms covering her face so that only her eyes showed.

Distractions, they work to get her mind off the blizzard, off the father who braved it all to look for the person he loves. But the wrong distractions come. Boys from her class making fun of her height, taking her lunch, threatening to trap her in the lockers. Girls with snide comments on how weird she is, taunting her lame fashion sense. She shudders. She thinks of her best friend, Mellie. The girl who shared lunch with her when the boys took hers. The girl who assured her she was pretty, despite the others who claimed the contrary. She wishes for her company, wishes she is at least safe. The temperature has dropped to the negatives, from what she last heard. If you spilled water outside, it would freeze before it hit the ground.

Her mind wanders to her father’s marriage, back when she was eight. It was a simple wedding. She remembers how beautiful her stepmother Anita was in her wedding dress. She remembers hugging her before the ceremony, telling her that she was beyond glad to finally have a mother. Her father was all smiles, nervous but excited, and she swears that she had never seen him so happy.

She jolts back to the present, where Anita is stranded out there, and Warner is out to find her. She buries her face in her arms. They’ll be alright, she tells herself. They’ll come back soon.

The wind howls, mocking her.

______________

She doesn’t know when it all started, to tell the truth. All she knows is that ice has always been so beautiful, so cold yet so incredibly amazing, and that she can mold it in ways no ordinary person could. And, weirdly enough, that’s all she knows. Her power is all she has, it is all the knowledge she has left. Everything else about her is a mystery. Name, age, birthday… she can’t tell you what hers are, and it isn’t by choice. She doesn’t have a choice because there’s nothing to tell. Nothing she can remember, anyway.

Amnesia’s a fickle thing. It erases your identity, locks away memories you never knew you had. She finds herself wondering if it’s still there—if the old her is still alive somewhere, in a deep sleep at the back of her mind—is that too much to hope for? Is it too much to find that old loose thread connecting you to your past?

But wherever the old her is, she doesn’t find it. Can’t find it. So she simply stops. She doesn’t remember when she did, when the realization kicked in, but she knows now that the present is more important than the past, that the future lies in tangles ahead, just waiting to be discovered. She embraces this without reserve, the same way she embraces everything else, because she’s just so open. She’s an open door letting everything in, everything: people, thoughts, stray homeless cats—she has a place for them all. She likes to integrate herself into the community, the world, that by doing so, she believes she is making a difference.

That’s the one thing that always stands out—her drive to change the world. She wants to make it better, and she does try. From cleaning dishes in the mess hall to teaching little kids to read and write, from standing up for her friends to sacrificing her life for the greater good. Nothing is an impossibility, well, almost. Her naivety is her hamartia, it betrays her in the end. She puts her trust everywhere, to friends and dogs and water jugs (yes, you read that right). She has faith in the universe, she believes that whatever happens, things will always work out. It’s a very odd belief for an amnesiac but she never runs out on optimism, and she wears a smile that never fades.

For someone so vibrant and cheery, her ice is an irony. Ice means cold, it freezes without mercy, it makes your teeth chatter and your fingers fall off, it’s a dangerous thing. But she thinks it’s amazing—shiny and glimmering and elegant, and she proves it. She summons figurines made of ice—rearing horses and miniature landscapes. She makes snowflakes out of water vapor because really, what’s more beautiful than a six-pointed symmetrical figure carved from nature itself? She shows people that ice is one of the most beautiful products of nature, and not the cold jagged structure accompanying Narnia’s Ice Queen. She doesn’t use ice to harm.

As a matter of fact, she doesn’t use anything to harm. She skips weapon-training and avoids the arena like a plague. She cringes at the mere thought of poking someone’s eye. It’s a miracle how she survived all these years. But she never ventures out of camp and if she did, she doesn’t remember. The only weapon she has is a sheathed celestial bronze knife that never seems to leave her, and she knows this for a fact because the number of times she tried to get rid of it is way waaaay off the charts. It’s always attached to her belt or her pants or skirt, basically like the remote in Click. Eventually she gives up and lets it be, but she has yet to use it. Her not using it is becoming a bad thing, sadly enough, as it marks her out in the eyes of bullies. And one place she avoids more than the arena is the dreaded Ares cabin with its barbed wires and disfigured boar’s head (like, she pities the poor boar so much). Her sensitive soul is not keen on being prodded on by malicious words. She hurts easily, the heart on her sleeve so easily battered and beat. She can’t stand the taunts so she stays in her home, the cabin of ice, the cabin honoring her mother Khione. There she busies herself with making beds and cleaning after her siblings, a childish motherly figure who aces at taking care of others, even if she absolutely fails at herself.

The fact that she spends more time indoors than outdoors shows in her pale skin, white as snow, lined by fading red scars she doesn’t know how she got. Her arms are littered with the things, lines across her wrist and elbow. She doesn’t care too much. She focuses more on her chocolate brown hair, curling around her face and tickling the sides of her neck, sometimes tied up in a loose bun. Her big eyes are a set of emeralds, usually wide in awe, letting anyone see through her soul. She is a little thing, standing at a flat five feet with a thin build to boot, but she doesn’t mind. She likes being small, she likes being a child.

Although she forgets her name, she isn’t totally nameless. They call her Snow, like the pretty snowflakes she makes. And she’s okay with that.

______________

The storm calms. She sits in shock, numbed, eyes glued to the door, ringed with sleep deprivation, because it has been twenty-four hours and she is still so alone— Her stomach grumbles madly but she doesn’t move, only rocking back and forth in her corner, the gnawing in her belly feeling so distant, detached— They’re not dead, they aren’t, they just got slowed down, that’s all…

She thinks of corpses, taunting schoolchildren and a frozen Mellie. Her heart hammers, seized by fear. So much fear.

Alone, isolated, she doesn’t have anyone anymore…

The last thing she sees before she blacks out is her door being blasted open by a figure with a baseball bat, and the last thing she hears is a hoarse bleat: “DEMIGOD!”

People will beat you and curse you and cheat you,Every one of them's bad, except you.

LUCIAN KEYNES | sixteen | may 17th

He looks up at the gray-haired woman poised on the rocking chair. She had let him sit on her lap and his smile is still in place, because it feels to him like the swing in the playground on the other block, only slower. No wonder Nana loves to sit on it. Maybe when he goes home he could ask his mommy to buy a small one for him so he could have his own makeshift swing back home.

“Well that’s an idea, Luke,” Nana says when he tells her his plan. “Maybe your Mommy would even have it especially made for you.”

But his smile falls, twitching into a frown. He thinks of his mommy—prim and proper, fussing about everything, leaving him in Nana’s house so that she could ‘work’—“I don’t think Mommy will get me one.”

“Oh? why not?”

“I don’t think she loves me. Do you think she loves me, Nana?”

The old woman is obviously surprised, he can tell as much from the way her face changed. “Oh, Luke, of course she loves you.”

The assurance makes him smile again, just for a little bit, but he looks away and thinks of all the times at the daycare, where his classmates were greeted by glad fathers and anxious mothers who gave them hugs and took them home. Meanwhile he would wait for Nana, the thin wiry woman trudging towards him with her cane, because his mommy had never come to fetch him from school, not even once. Maybe if mommy loved him, she could be the one he waited for every afternoon, and he would hug her like all the other kids who did their mothers and walk home with his hand in hers. It was because of ‘work,’ his mother had once said. Luke doesn’t know what ‘work’ is. But he hates it because it’s taking his mommy away from him.

______________

Lucian Keynes is a lone soul. Apparently, he’s trying to prove that yes, a man can be an island. Away from other islands, separated by long stretches of seas—it’s way easier. Lonely, but simpler. You don’t have to burden yourself with attachments, or relationships, or whatever else that could slow you down. It’s every man for himself out there, and he doesn’t want anyone getting in his way. Trust is worthless, at least to him. Everyone is bound to let you down at some point. He isn’t going to wait for that point to come. Trust no one but yourself, that’s how Luke goes by. Independent, stubborn and alone—that’s how he grew up.

______________

He tinkers. Ever since Nana passed on, he would lock himself in his room, his toys a scrambled mess before him, and he would play to his heart’s content to distract himself. He’s six years old now. A big boy. He puts together Legos to form buildings, helicopters, planes and robots, anything he could imagine. He spends hours on the floor, surrounded by a bunch of small blocks. It’s a chore for other kids who even have their parents to help them, but Luke knows that he couldn’t count on his mother for help. She is too busy with work. He has an idea about work now, knows that it is something that would give them money. He hates it less, but only by a bit, because why can’t they get money without his mother distancing herself from him?

Luke sighs and sits back, admiring the tank he built with Legos. It’s about a foot tall, modeled from the picture of a real-life tank sitting against the foot his bed. He nicked it from Leon’s bag when he isn’t looking. Leon told him that his father worked there, with tanks and airplanes and guns. He wondered if that’s all Mommy does too, but Leon said that his father wouldn’t come home for months, and Mommy comes home every night so Luke doesn’t think it’s the type of work she does.

He grins as he looks at the mini-tank, his eyes sparkling with childish wonder. Then he gives a fleeting glance at the closed door. He yearns to pick the tank up and go downstairs, show Mommy what he’s done. But he has done that before and she didn’t even look at him, and she had all these books open and papers everywhere. She ushered him back outside and forbade him to enter her study again. He gets the hint; he’s always been a smart boy, his teacher said, and he’s also a good boy because he never goes to the study again, just like Mommy told him to.

But his smile turns sad as he fidgets with his tank. If only Mommy didn’t have work.

______________

Someday it’s going to bite him back, the way he works alone. It’s his biggest flaw, his independence, the very thing that could lead to his downfall. He is closed off from others even if it isn’t obvious from the get-go. Luke can be cordial, polite—he even jokes around every now and then. But when it boils down to it, he doesn’t open up to anyone. Although he treats people nicely, even goes as far as to call them friends in company, he sees them more as a means to get what he wants. When Luke befriends people, there is always a motive. Maybe he likes the way you make him laugh, or how you’re good with a pen or a paintbrush. He sees some use in you, so he tries to get in your good books. It sounds cruel, but that’s just the way he works. This bird flies solo.

The good thing about Luke is that he is reliable—at least, to a certain extent. He’ll get the job done, effectively and efficiently, although he can be a bit of a perfectionist. He makes an awful addition to teams. Teamwork is a foreign concept. He doesn’t trust anyone to do their tasks, and he often gets naggy and ultimately tries to take over, thinking he can do it better than them. His eyes are set on the goal, not the destination, and he often overlooks details and others just to make sure that the end result is perfect. Luke’s sense of morality isn’t exactly conforming with the society’s ethics either—he bends the rules, twists them, so long as he gets what he wants. And this is all behind-the-scenes, masking his purpose from the public.

______________

He hears the door open downstairs, followed by laughter. He can recognize his mother’s voice but there is someone else, a deep throaty laugh of a man, that isn’t familiar to him. Curious, he drops the wrench and leaves his work-in-progress, tiptoeing to the door and opening it a fraction. The living room is well within sight. Sure enough there is Karen Keynes, dressed in her prim and proper workclothes, leading a man towards the sofa. Luke sees their hands linked together, and Karen lets go to offer him refreshments.

He isn’t dumb. He knows what’s going on. Wiping his sweaty palms on the fabric of his shirt—which isn’t really presentable, with threads coming loose at the ends—he takes a tentative step out of his room, quiet as a mouse, and waits for his mother to call him. The man doesn’t see him yet, he is too engrossed with the magazine he picked up, and Luke crosses his fingers. Karen comes back with two cups of coffee, dropping to one of the comfortable chairs soon after, with her back to Luke’s room. He waits some more.

She doesn’t call him. And she doesn’t seem to have plans to. Luke watches her chat with the man, hears their laughter echo in the walls, and it fills him with anger, makes his fists clench in his sides. Isn’t she going to introduce him? No? Well then.

“Hey, Mom,” he walks in the living room, tattered shirt and all, pasting a smile on his face and feeling a slight satisfaction when both adults jumped at the sound of his voice.

“Luke!” Karen says, aghast, and she rises to her feet. “I thought you were already asleep. Uh,” she looks wildly at their guest, as if expecting something to explode, “This is Harry Warrington, one of my colleagues at work. Harry, this is Luke, my… son.”

He doesn’t miss the hesitation, but he pretends he did. Luke walks up to the man, holding his hand out. He might be thirteen, but still, that’s coming close to being a man, right? A teenager, but whatever. They shake hands firmly, and Harry is the first to let go. Luke is aware of the slightly confused gleam in the man’s eyes as he studies him, and he defiantly stares back. The pieces are put together in his head. He doesn’t know he existed.

It doesn’t really come as a surprise. It’s not a secret that his mother isn’t overly pleased to have him. There are no pictures of him in the living room, no photo albums in the center table, nothing to show that a boy lived in their humble home. Despite his talents, his achievements, his mother is ashamed of him. Luke feels something in his chest crack. He thinks he has always known, but having met Harry Warrington, the harsh truth sinks in.

His mother asks if he needs anything, offers to tuck him in, and he pretends to be offended because he is already thirteen and doesn’t need her to tuck him in. It’s only partly true. He is offended, and he doesn’t need her to do anything for him. He promises that to himself as he turns on his heel and makes his way back to his room. He chokes on his breath as he closes the door, and he wipes his eyes with his sleeve.

People. They always let you down.

______________

Luke is quite muscular, having spent almost all his time tinkering and lifting things. His upper body strength is just a little over normal for a sixteen-year-old boy, and he often uses this to his advantage. Besides his strength, Luke is good with a crossbow and a sword. He frequently wears a wristband of his own invention, magically enchanted to turn into either a sword or a crossbow. Unfortunately, arrows are not included, and he has yet to find a way to incorporate them into the equation. Meanwhile, he sticks with his trusty old sword, three feet of lean mean celestial bronze.

With his weapon inconspicuously concealed as a wristband, Luke looks like a normal mortal teenager. His black hair is always cut short, as he doesn’t want it to get in the way. He’s a tall guy at 5’9”, with his tanned complexion and hairy arms. Luke’s eyes are almond brown, always squinting, because he keeps denying the fact that he needs glasses. He has been described to be good-looking by some, but he doesn’t really care too much.

______________

Two years pass and he never sees Harry Warrington again. After he hears muffled sobs coming from his mother’s room, he doesn’t wonder why. He is more concerned with the state of his recent inventions. They’re nothing big, just a regular TV remote upgraded into a universal remote for the whole living room, or his customized sound-operated coffee maker. Both have gone missing.

He thinks he might have misplaced them and it’s driving him mad, because he’s pretty sure that he never misplaces anything. He has always gotten everything down to the T. His room is even organized most of the time. Well, mostly because he has a regular habit of inviting his friends and girlfriend over, but still.

Luke stops in front of the study. A faint sense of foreboding overcomes him. He isn’t allowed in here. But he can’t help himself and besides, he isn’t going to enter, he just wants to talk to his mom. He raises a slightly shaking hand and knocks. “Mom, have you seen my remote? And coffee maker?”

There’s the sound of scuffling, it lasts for a few seconds before she answers, “No. They’re probably where you left them.”

He takes note of how she keeps spending her time locked up in the study these days. He isn’t really complaining. Karen seems to be nicer these days, not to mention richer. The other day she bought him new T-shirts, and she herself flaunted a new set of gold earrings and necklaces. He could even hear her humming to the walls in glee—quite a weird sight, but he doesn’t comment. He’s more preoccupied with his missing things.

“Okay,” he answers, his shoulders slumped as he walks away. If only he could remember where he left them, but he is certain that it’s in the attic. He never puts his things—inventions, especially—elsewhere.

______________

Being a son of Hephaestus, Luke is a natural when it comes to technology and machinery. Artistic, creative… Those are only some of the words used to describe his talent. He is known to whip up a masterpiece even with a couple of metal scraps. He spends his time in the forges, making weapons and other things, just like he has always done in the past. His forte is with machines, which he has always believed to be more trustworthy than humans. Luke openly admires Tony Stark. Someday, he will build himself his own Iron Man suit.

______________

He gets home early one day, school being cancelled because of a faculty meeting, and he goes straight to the attic to hopefully get some work done on his new prototype. But as he climbs the dusty old ladder, he is met with the biggest surprise of his life.

Karen Keynes freezes when she spots him, shock written all over her face, and Luke doesn’t quite understand until he sees the metal contraption in her arms—his robot—

He stares blankly, uncomprehending. “What the hell are you doing?” he demands.

She opens her mouth, closes it, then quickly puts the robot back on his desk, and Luke notices the open carton box by her feet. Peeking from it is the shiny top of the laptop he built from the scraps he picked up from the junkyard. Realization dawns. “Have you been taking my stuff?”

“Luke, please, you misunderstand me. I-I was just—”

“The remote, coffee maker…” His mind is a blur. He doesn’t hear the words she is saying, they don’t seem important, drowned by the gears grinding hard and fast in his brain, attempting to understand… “You took them. But where…”

Karen looks frightened, a deer caught in headlights. “Luke, please understand, I did it for you, for us, for both of us—” She absently reaches for her necklace, and Luke understands. He understands what happened, what his mother has been doing. And anger takes over.

“For years you treated me like an annoying fly you want so badly to swat. You didn’t want me around, I know. My father knocked you up when you were nineteen and I was the result. It ruined your life, didn’t it? I ruined your life. That’s why you always hated me, right?” His fist sweeps a couple of old trophies off the shelf, they come crashing to the floor one by one, but the sounds are not enough to drown his next words. “I put up with it, kept to myself, not wanting to bother you and yet… and yet you took my hard-earned creations without even asking me, and selling them? For what, jewelry?”

“Luke—”

But he has already turned away from her, slamming the door so hard that dust went flying, and he goes straight to his room. Clothes are gathered, bags are packed. He’s had enough.

______________

After he ran away, Luke was led to camp by mechanical spiders sent by his father. He was claimed almost instantly, staying year-round. Luke is grateful, but only barely. The scars are still fresh, the wounds burn, even if it’s already been a year. He doubts they will ever fade. That’s why he doesn’t trust. People—they always, always let you down.